Abstract
Purpose/Objectives: Medical documentation has become increasingly challenging for providers, particularly with changes to telemedicine visit formats during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Medical scribes may help mitigate this burden. Our objective was to determine how scribes affect provider efficiency during the COVID-19 pandemic.Materials/Methods: Providers completed a survey in February 2020 (S1, prepandemic) and 1 year into the COVID-19 pandemic in February 2021 (S2, during pandemic). S1 evaluated perceived impact of scribes on clerical work, medical documentation, and efficiency during office visits using the Likert scale. S2 also addressed scribe use during telemedicine visits. Provider time spent on documentation with or without a scribe was evaluated using a five-level ordinal scale. Provider response was assessed using descriptive frequency statistics. Fisher's exact test was used to compare categorical variables. Analysis was performed using SAS version 9.4 (SAS Institute, Inc., Cary, NC). All tests were two sided with an alpha level of 0.05.Results: Fifty-eight providers responded to the surveys: 36 (62%) for S1 and 22 (38%) for S2. Scribe use decreased perceived clerical work and facilitated chart review, and recording of physical examination findings, note documentation, and improved efficiency, both before and during the pandemic (p = 0.5, p = 0.7, p = 0.8, p = 0.8, p = 0.9, respectively). Scribe use significantly decreased time to complete documentation prepandemic (p = 0.002) and during the pandemic for both in-person (p ≤ 0.0001) and telemedicine visits (p = 0.0004). More providers took >60 min to complete medical documentation without the use of a scribe prepandemic (72% vs. 30% with a scribe, p = 0.006) and during the pandemic, after both in-person (40% vs. 0% with a scribe, p = 0.002) and telemedicine visits (35% vs. 0% with a scribe, p = 0.002).Conclusions: Scribe use decreases provider time spent on medical documentation and improves overall efficiency before and during the COVID-19 pandemic for both in-person and telemedicine visits. Integration of scribes into radiation oncology in-person and telemedicine clinics may improve provider satisfaction by reducing burden of documentation.
Highlights
Origin International US Sites Multi-center Single-center Funding Government Industry Other Trial Phase Early Phase I & Phase I Phase I/II Phase II & Phase II/III Phase III Allocation Randomized Non-randomized Average Number of Study Arms Average Length of Study in Years Average Number of Participants
Less than half of the completed clinical trials in radiation oncology from 20002005 were published; Phase III status, multi-center sites, non-industry funding, randomized allocation larger participant pools, and a longer study duration all contributed to successful publication of those trials
Purpose/Objective(s): Medical documentation has become increasingly challenging for providers, with time constraints and changes to office visit formats during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic
Summary
Origin International US Sites Multi-center Single-center Funding Government Industry Other Trial Phase Early Phase I & Phase I Phase I/II Phase II & Phase II/III Phase III Allocation Randomized Non-randomized Average Number of Study Arms Average Length of Study in Years Average Number of Participants. Purpose/Objective(s): Historical models of physician productivity in radiation oncology focus on external-beam (EBRT) volume. As the field has transitioned to hypofractionated regimens, stereotactic treatments, and an increase in radiation oncology procedures, this model has become outdated and no longer reflects physician work effort and productivity.
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